Office Hours – September 1, 2017

Recording of Office Hours hosted by Chris Davis on September 1, 2017.

Transcript

ChrisDavis: All right, so Peter, I’m going to go to your question first. Let me get you up here. For those of you who, this is your first time, I like to put the question up, so that people watching this in the future can know exactly what we were talking about, and they serve as good timestamps, right? If you’re scrubbing through the video, and you want to see where we’re at, what [00:00:30] question currently is being answered, this serves as a easy way.

All right, first, AC … Okay. “I have a couple questions regarding the AC CRM. First, AC sometimes alerts me to emails that have come in from deals very quickly.” Also, “I have also received alerts as long as two days after receiving the email. Is that … ” If it’s a known bug, and is it being fixed? That’s a tough one, because I’m not sure what other logic you have set up. A lot of times, if you’re receiving the same [00:01:00] alert two days afterwards, it lends me to believe that there’s some setting somewhere that has it repeat, especially if it’s happening across many deals. Very rarely will we send another one out.

I would recommend just double checking to make sure there’s not an automation that has a wait state, and when you’re creating the tasks or your alerts, make sure that the deal is not moving to another stage, or there’s other activity [00:01:30] that is not going on with that deal. Yeah, that’s a hard one. That’s really tough to know if it’s a bug, because it could be anticipated behavior, and there may be something that we’re overlooking. What I would recommend is get a support ticket in, and let somebody look at it, just in case it is. You may be the first to identify it, and then we could get it cleaned up before it really hits many other people.

You had another one, too, Peter. [00:02:00] Let me get to your second question. There we go. Yeah, yeah, no problem, Peter. You’re very welcome. You are very welcome. The next one, this is Peter’s second question. “One of your competitors, whose initials are HS …” Is that high school? Are we competitors with high schools, Peter? “… send an email daily of known companies [00:02:30] that have visited your site, for example Facebook.” Uh-huh (affirmative). “Is there a way to integrate that sort of data with AC?”

Hmm. That’s a good question. Essentially, now, I’m familiar with this platform. I used it in a previous life, but I don’t know if I dug deep into the emails of companies that have visited. The closest thing that you’re going to get is site tracking in ActiveCampaign. [00:03:00] I think there’s other tools that are better for this exact purpose, more of the progressive profiling platforms that will not only tell you the companies, but if somebody from that company visited your site, and they took action with an email not from the company, so if they used a Hotmail or a Gmail, it can connect that data with the company, too, but [00:03:30] that’s not behavior that you can expect out of ActiveCampaign. We have site tracking, and that’s the level of depth we’ll go to at this moment, but I’m not saying cancel it out. Ideas@activecampaign.com, throw it in there.

I wish I was more familiar with this exact email. I know what you’re talking about, because they have progressive [00:04:00] profiling in there, and then you could link companies and contact records all in one, so I know exactly what you’re talking about. We don’t have anything like that, and honestly, from the users that I know, when they’re looking for that type of profiling for companies, they use standalone software to do it. I hope that helps, Peter. Hope that helps.

Next one, Michelle, I’ve got an email [00:04:30] from you. All right, let me see here. Let me see. I’m going to copy this, Michelle, and put it … Let me just move this up some, just like I’m scrolling. Michelle, all right. I’m doing well, Michelle. Thank you for asking. Glad to have you on. “Please let us know how to create goals and automations so that people are not waiting in [00:05:00] queue.” Ah, yes. Good one. Then, “Also, can you give an overview on how to use the wait and If/Else in the conditions and workflow?” Absolutely. These are good questions, and they’re really tied. These questions are really tied together, tied to one another, and I’ll show you why and how.

This is why I’m happy for every question asked. A lot of times, you may not know [00:05:30] this, but you go through this mental exercise when you’re thinking about or mapping out your automations before you build them. Should I use a goal or an If/Else? At least I do. That’s a question I’m frequently asking myself, is, “Should I use a goal here, or can an If/Else do what I need it to do?” All right? I think the answer to that question is essentially what we’re going to come up with as I answer Michelle’s questions.

Michelle, we’re going to just use [00:06:00] a basic start trigger. I’m going to go down. If I wanted to create a goal, let’s say … Let me at least have an action, okay? I’m just going to say, new welcome, all right? I have a action, and maybe my goal is for someone to sign up for a trial or something like that. I’ll go here. I’ll grab a goal and say, signed [00:06:30] up for demo. When this condition is met, tag is … Oops. Oops, scheduled demo, okay? That’s my criteria. At this point, when someone meets this goal, they’re going to jump to it.

Here’s how you said it, Michelle, whether you want them to wait forever or go through [00:07:00] the goal, all right? If I hit continue anyway, what’s going to happen is the contact’s going to subscribe. They’re going to get this email. Hey, look at that gray, or that dark … Oh, that’s different. They’re going to get this email, and then they’re going to come to this goal, and even if they don’t match the criteria, they’re going to go through, okay?

Now, the second one is wait until conditions are met. [00:07:30] If you have this set, Michelle, what they’re going to do is, they’re going to come through, they’re going to get this email, and then they will be queued right here. When you ask how do you create goals and automations so that people are not waiting in queue, what you’ll want to do is make sure that it’s either continue anyway, or end this automation, okay? That way, when they hit this goal, they’re either going to end their path, or they’re going to go right through [00:08:00] it. That’s one.

Then, if I were to give you an overview on how to use the wait and If/Else in the conditions, let’s take the same goal criteria and see what’s different if I use a If/Else, okay? For this one, if someone subscribes, and they already have a demo … Let me illustrate this, just because I don’t want to lose anybody here. I think my tablet’s working today. Oh, it’s on the wrong screen. I don’t know how to [00:08:30] put it on the other screen. Well, bear with me one second. Normally, this tablet knows which screen I want to be on, so just let me get this really quick. I want monitor two. Oh, monitor two. There we go.

All right, so let me do this, and [00:09:00] we’re all good, I thought. Why is everything fighting me today? Whoa, that’s not what I wanted to do. What just happened? Sorry, everybody. This is not normal. There we go. All right. We will get there. One more time. [00:09:30] Come on. Okay. It’s not going to show for me today. I wanted to draw on the screen, so what I’ll do is I’ll let Zoom help me out. All right. My apologies there. All right. Let me just make sure … All right. Great. [00:10:00] It’s working.

Now, I lost my train of thought. If/Else, oh, okay. Remember, they’re going to opt in here. If this is somebody, they’ll opt in here, and if this criteria is … If they meet this criteria, what’s going to happen is the second they subscribe, they’re going to jump down here and then go on. That means they will not get [00:10:30] that email, okay? They will not get that email. That’s what that means. This is how the goal works. This is the intention of the goal, is to allow people to progress, so when we start and end progress based on the criteria, okay? If we want people to wait until the criteria is met, then that can be handled with an If/Else, but [00:11:00] if want somebody to skip off the same criteria, then we want to use a goal to advance them.

The thing to remember with goals, everybody, is once true, always true, okay? Once they sign up for a demo … Let me show you. As long as this criteria right here, right here, jump to this action when, the minute that criteria is true, it doesn’t [00:11:30] matter where it’s true from. Maybe this tag was added in another automation. The minute that criteria is true and the contact is in this automation, they’re going to leap. They’re going to jump to this position. That’s what’s going to happen. Now, we’re talking about a dynamic, a dynamic journey, okay? This means I can jump and I can bounce around an automation, so it’s kind of like pinball. [00:12:00] I can have a goal anywhere in the automation, and when it’s set, I would just transfer over to where that is, like transporting, all right?

Now, If/Else comes when you want it to be linear. Think of a goal. Think of it like this. This is the best way I can illustrate this, everybody, and Michelle, let me know if this makes sense. Let’s say I have step one, two, three, [00:12:30] and four, okay? This is the goal approach. What I can do with goals is I can accomplish these steps in any order, okay? I can start here and maybe bounce to three, maybe bounce to two, and then bounce to four. I can essentially choose my own adventure, okay? I execute those steps in [00:13:00] the order that I meet the criteria, not in the order that they’re built, okay? That’s what a goal allows you to do.

Real quick, Keshia, to get to yours, I see here you say, “Regardless of the number of emails in the sequence?” Absolutely. A better way to state it is I can achieve and bounce around over as many actions. There’s no limit. Maybe it’s five actions. Maybe one is send an email, one is SMS, [00:13:30] one is a webhook, it doesn’t matter. Whatever is before the goal, I’m going to skip all of it, so it’s not a singular thing. I’ll skip all of it, okay? Like I say, goals allow you to do all that. Maybe I went from one to three. Then, I went from three to two. Then, I went from two to four.

Now, this could be good if you want people to be able to autoprogress through your content, all right? However, [00:14:00] the If/Else … Let me just say, If/Else, if I’ve got one, two, three, four, guess what? I have to do them in that order, okay? If/Else is sequential, so if you’re going through a process that you want them to complete step one before they complete [00:14:30] step two, and they need to complete step two before they complete step three, like you want them to complete the entire process, then you need to use an If/Else, okay?

Another good reason to use an If/Else is if you only want this criteria … Whatever the goal criteria is, if you only want it to advance them once, right? Because remember, [00:15:00] once this criteria is true, it’s always true, so this is always going to happen. If you don’t want the jump, if you don’t want that jump functionality to always happen, then don’t use a goal. I would use a If/Else plus a go to.

You know what, this is essentially, this is what it all breaks down to. I’m so glad you asked this question. A goal, when we look at a goal, [00:15:30] it is essentially, a goal is equal to criteria, which could be conditioned. I should say condition. It is a condition, a wait, and … How was I going to say this? It’s a condition, a wait, and a jump. All [00:16:00] three of these actions are packed inside of a goal, okay? If we X out jump, then these two are equal to an If/Else. That’s what these two would equal, is a If/Else, okay? Criteria, condition, and wait is essentially an … I shouldn’t say If/Else. It’s a wait with an If/Else.

[00:16:30] Let me show you what I mean. That’s a little confusing. I’m sorry. Let me clear this out. Let me show you what I mean. Saying If/Else is not accurate. I’m going to build this same signup for a demo logic right under it, okay? Whoa, let me go back to my mouse here. I can say this: I can do a wait, okay? I’m going to combine the wait with the If/Else, Michelle, just like you asked, all right? I’m going to wait [00:17:00] until specific conditions are met, and then this is going to be … The tag is scheduled demo, all right? Now, I can put a time … I’m not going to use a time limit now, because I don’t want to overcomplicate things. All right, so now I have the wait function. Remember, if I go here … [00:17:30] Let me put it up here, so we can have it. Come on. There we go. A goal is one, it’s a condition, it’s a wait, and three, it’s a jump, all right?

Right here, I have a wait until the tag is scheduled, or [00:18:00] the tag is added, so I’ve got my condition, and I have my wait, just by using the wait until and adding a condition to it, right? I can always wait until five days, four days, whatever, so now, I have my wait and my condition, but guess what? It will never happen. You can never jump. You can’t. I mean, that is the biggest differentiator between the wait with [00:18:30] a condition and a jump with the goals, right? That’s our first differentiator.

Now, let’s just say, and it works well if we say, look, now we have the problem, Michelle, of them being queued. They’ll be queued here forever. They will be queued here forever, because … Well, I will say, they’ll be queued here until they have the … Hey, how did podcast get in there? Thought I said demo. [00:19:00] They’ll be queued here until that criteria is met, which could be forever. Why does it keep doing that? Which could be forever, okay, if they wait until this criteria is met, and the condition is never met.

What we would do is we can add a time limit and say one week. What does this mean? This now means this is going to wait for this condition to be true, or [00:19:30] this condition to be true. It’s an or. Any time either of those are true, they’re going to proceed, okay? If they have the tag before one week, they’ll go. If it takes a week, and they don’t have the tag, they’ll still proceed, right? What we would need to do at that point, we don’t know which case was the truth, right? We don’t know if it was because they had the tag, or was it because a week transpired? [00:20:00] What would we have to do? We have to combine this with an If/Else, okay? This If/Else is going to look for if the tag exists. You see, this is linear. They cannot move past this step. They have to accomplish this step before going to the next action. They have to, so it’s very one, two, three, where, [00:20:30] like I said, goals just allow you to jump, jump and progress.

If they go down the yes path, what do we know? We know this condition was met by the tag being added. If they go down the no path, we know the condition has been met, that it’s been one week. Essentially, this logic is all packed into this goal, but it’s missing the jump, [00:21:00] which, as I mentioned, is not a bad thing. It’s just all dependent on what you want to do. Do you need them to jump? If you don’t need them to jump, use your wait condition with an If/Else. If you do need them to jump, use a goal. They’re both using the same condition, and they’re both waiting for that same condition to be met, okay? Hopefully, that helps.

[00:21:30] Mark says, “What is your criteria to determine if goal or If/Else is a better option?” For me, it’s all about the jump. It’s all about the jump, Mark. The questions I’m asking, if I want a goal … Oh, you know what? How could I forget this, the fourth element? I am so sorry. The fourth element, and I’ll keep it green, is measurement. How could I forget [00:22:00] that? That’s a huge one, because that comes into play whether I’m using a goal or an If/Else. The goal is going to be when I want someone to … I want them to jump, and normally, when I want them to jump, I want them to stop receiving the emails or stop receiving the prior actions, okay?

A good use case for this, everybody … Let me modify this [00:22:30] a bit. I’m going to copy it, copy the single action, and I’m going to change this back to wait until, wait for a day. Then, after that, I’m going to send an email. Okay. [00:23:00] From there, check this out. Let’s say the whole point of my emails … And it could be up to five or six. I just don’t want to waste time and build them all out, so let’s just imagine it’s five emails. The whole purpose of me sending these emails was for them to sign up for a demo. The minute they sign up for a demo, I [00:23:30] want them to stop receiving the emails. So if they subscribe, they get email number one, and they’re waiting right here.

Now, if they satisfy the goal criteria, if they satisfy this, now, I don’t have to worry about them getting this email, [00:24:00] because this email, the CTA … I’ll just say the CTA, the call to action, is to sign up. Well, they already did that, so why would I want to send them this email? At this point, now they jump here, skip the email, and proceed. Whether I want to use a goal or not, not only is it the jump, but now, I can go to my [00:24:30] automation view and see how effective my emails are to achieving this goal, because it’s going to show me my conversion rate at the automation screen.

If it’s action that I want to measure, and I want people to jump, those are the two differentiators as you see right up here. Let me just draw this line. Those are the two differentiators that say I need to use a goal, right? If all four of these are the case, [00:25:00] and I’ll just put five in there, is dynamic flow. If you need all of this, then use a goal, right?

You can use the If/Else … I’ll say wait plus If/Else, if one, you have a condition, [00:25:30] two, you want them to wait until said condition is made, and three, you want it to be linear, which means they can’t get to step two without completing step one. If we use the same setup here, and instead of signing up for a demo, it was another [00:26:00] wait, that means there’s no way that we could eliminate them from getting the second email. They would have to, because remember, it’s linear, so they have to go through each step. There’s no way to complete it without accomplishing each step, and there are places for that. I mean, think about an onboarding sequence, right? Day one, day two, day three, you want that to be linear. Any decision [00:26:30] on what you want to do next can only happen after the previous action, right?

Maybe you want to see if, have they opened the email, right? If not, then do something else. If so, let me just do it. Like here, if I wanted to say conditions and workflow If/Else, and say actions … I’m going to clear this out, because it looks a little distracting … Has opened an email, [00:27:00] right? Now, this condition will only be exercised after the email. Actually, I wanted it here. I wanted it here, yeah. Okay. There’s no way for this If/Else condition to be executed until after both this [00:27:30] and this, you see what I’m saying? As you look at it, when I’m talking about linear, that means they have to complete the previous steps. If I’m using a goal, I’m saying, “Well, I don’t want them to have to complete everything. I want to immediately advance them when they’re done.” Use a goal. Then, if you’re saying, “Listen, I need them to hit, do every step exactly how I outlined it,” you’re going to need to use an If/Else, okay?

[00:28:00] Eustan, love the … Yeah, sure. Sure, I’ll save it. It’s something I found and downloaded, Eustan. I’ll be glad to share with you guys. I’ll send it to you via email. Mark says, “Goals are like superheroes. They have superpowers and can jump.” Yes. “Advantage of goals is better reportings.” Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Advantage of goals are for better reporting. Yeah. We have goals reporting. Michelle, when you’re thinking about using goals … Hey, Bill. You made it. [00:28:30] Bill, if you could do me a favor, I did get your email. I got your email. I haven’t had a chance to watch the video, though, so my apologies in advance. If you have an opportunity, if you could just summarize it in a couple sentences, I can give it a go, but I just wanted to let you know that I did not get to watch the actual video yet. I had a lot of emails this week, so my apologies in advance for that.

Yeah, Michelle, when you’re thinking about using goals, those are [00:29:00] the questions that you need to ask yourself, okay? When you’re sitting down, and you’re looking at a goal, and you’re looking at a If/Else, you’re asking, “I have a condition, and I have a wait.” That’s given. That’s why you’re even thinking about a If/Else and a wait, or a goal, right? I have a condition, and I have a wait, so that’s a given. That’s in both cases. But now, the path splits when it says … Let’s just keep drawing, everybody. [00:29:30] I have a condition, and then I have some waits. At this point, though, the path splits, okay? Here, I have linear progression. Here, I have dynamic, we’ll just say jump, okay? [00:30:00] Then, if I keep going, I have measurement. If that’s the case, you need to use a goal. If this is the case, use a If/Else plus wait, okay?

That’s the logic behind it, right? You start with a condition and wait, and then you go and say, “Hey, do I need them to complete these steps in sequence, [00:30:30] in order?” If so, then I need to use a If/Else plus a wait, or if I want them to be able to jump around, and I want to measure it, then I need to use a goal, okay?

All right, Keshia. Keshia’s got a question. I don’t know if I already answered this, Keshia, but I’m going to post it here and answer it, just in case, just in case. [00:31:00] Did I spell that right, K-E … Right? Yeah. All right. Once they click a link and purchase, we give them the tag purchase product. That is one way, right? That’s one way to do it. If you’re using something like deep data, like WooCommerce, deep data, Shopify, deep data, you could have a tag be added from that platform, right? Maybe you have [00:31:30] some shopping cart, like I don’t know, ThriveCart, SamCart, anything cart, you know, any cart. When someone purchases on that platform, it has the ability to tag or add that tag, right? The minute that tag is added, they’re going to proceed to wherever that goal is.

Just to top it off, understand, too, I can use a goal as a start trigger, right? [00:32:00] Goal is achieved, and this will look for any existing goal in any other automation. This is a way to link, another way to link automations. When they achieve some goal, like let’s just say they enrolled in a course, and they achieved it, and the first time they do it, then all of this … When they achieve that goal, maybe I have a platform that tells me, [00:32:30] that applies a tag when the course is completed, and that triggers this goal. Now, that goal is going to trigger this automation and get it to start. So, yes. Yes, yes, yes.

All right, great questions. Keep them coming. Yeah, okay. Great. Keshia got it. All right. Well, actually, [00:33:00] maybe it wasn’t. I may be looking at it different. I think I’m looking at it different, Bill. All right, so okay, she figured it out in the email. She wanted to … Newsletters and … Okay, so she figured it out. Hey, Mark. I’m going to post yours up here. All right, it looks like we’re [00:33:30] getting down. Bill, let me make sure I have the right Bill. Aren’t you the one that sent me the Dropbox? I think you did. I can’t find it in my … Okay, it was you. I wanted to make sure I didn’t get you mixed up. Let me pull this up, because I’ve got a few Bills, a few Bills in my inbox, and that’s [00:34:00] not you. Bill Wright, there it is, Bill Wright. All right, there we go. Got it. Bill [inaudible 00:34:08] a popular name. Believe it or not, there’s no Bill at ActiveCampaign, can you believe that? Crazy. All right.

Mark, let me get to your question. Oops. Mark, “With deep data integration, [00:34:30] does AC add new fields automatically for your purchase history, or do you have to create new custom fields?” All right, so let me pause there. Let me answer this one. The deep data fields are automatically generated for you, and they’re generated under their own category, like these are info … Phil, I’ve got to get Phil. Phil always has something on his contact record. Let’s see. [00:35:00] He’s got no deep data. Are you serious? That is so interesting. I would have thought, out of all the people, Phil … Interesting.

Okay. No worries. I can go here to my tags, WooCommerce customer. What account … Oh. Oh, that’s why, because Phil is here. There we go. How about lucky blue? These fields right here, this eCommerce, when you have deep data [00:35:30] in there … “I have to leave, but thank you for answering my …” Okay, no problem, Michelle. Have a good one. Thanks for asking.

This deep data portion here is what is automatically created for you. These aren’t actually custom fields, although they appear and function … They’re presented like they are, but these are really classified as deep data fields. You don’t have to create those, [00:36:00] and you don’t have to create them, honestly. If you created them in a custom field, they would show in a custom field, as a custom field instead of a deep data field, and here’s what I mean. When you go into the segment builder, you see you’ve got custom fields here, but look at this, eCommerce, see? These are all of the fields that are automatically added when you have deep data, okay? If you want to go total orders is one, you want everybody with one [00:36:30] order, hit a search, and it should find all of these people have one order, okay? That’s true, because I just have one order here. You see, we’ve got fields for eCommerce, and then we’ve got fields for each order. All of those are automatically created for you, okay?

Then, “Also, if there are future purchases, does AC keep the historical data? If so, how do you access it, the historical data for use in automations?” Yeah, so the historical [00:37:00] data will be here in the orders. You’ll also see it in notes, okay? You’ll see it in notes. Depending on your integration, if you’re using WooCommerce, I believe you’ll see notes over here, but all of your data will be right here. All of your historical data will be right here, right? Order number, you’ll see each order number for that contact, and then when you’re in an automation, what you’ll want to do is you’ll have to use the If/Else. Well, you don’t have to. No, I’m lying. You don’t have to use a If/Else, at all. [00:37:30] You just have to use the segment builder. Whether it’s a goal criteria or whatever … Here’s what I mean.

Now, I’ll just piggyback off of what Michelle had us looking at. I’ll go to a goal, and I’ll say purchased at least one product. When I go into the segment builder, you’ll see, I have access [00:38:00] to eCommerce. See? Total orders is one. The minute they purchase an order, one, they’ll achieve this goal. This would be really good if I wanted to wait until somebody has purchased at least five things, right? I could use a goal, and they’ll wait there until they’ve purchased five things. If they enter this automation and they’ve already purchased five things, they’ll pick up right where they left off. You could also [00:38:30] do total amount spent. Now, all of that deep data … This is really the importance of it. Now all of these deep data fields are goal conditions or segment conditions, all right? That’s how you would use it in an automation.

Let me see. Mark, you have a followup. Let me put that here. All [00:39:00] right. “AC pulls all data points from the eCommerce platform, product name, price, et cetera?” Yes, even categories. What you’ll see is, right here, I have this product, your freebie. If I have a category, it’ll have the category name dash your freebie, so that when you’re searching for products, like if you were to change this to … [00:39:30] See that, last product name is, and I could say free … I don’t know what I would call it, your freebie. Just to be safe, I always like to do contains when I’m doing eCommerce.

Now, when someone purchases your freebie, or like you saw here, Mark, it could be in a product category, the last category of the product they purchased. [00:40:00] Yeah. Deep data’s going to pull all of that information, and just so all know, let’s say you were running a eCommerce site for the last two years, and all of that information is in eCommerce, the minute you do this, the minute you go here to my settings, integrations, and then you add a WooCommerce, or you add a deep data integration, [00:40:30] it’s going to retroactively go and pull all of those orders and update your existing contacts in ActiveCampaign. It’s going to do that, yeah. All right.

Let me see here, one more question on the deep data Mark has, or I should say another. “Can AC calculate lifetime value, total of all sales to date?” Lifetime [00:41:00] value won’t be a calculation that you’ll see here, but you’ll see total revenue. You can definitely see total revenue. The difference between lifetime value and total revenue is the equation of lifetime value, because there’s a lot of other variables that can go into lifetime customer value. You have your retention rate and all of those, so that would be more of a projection, but you can at least find [00:41:30] the total amount spent. Yeah. Yeah.

Keshia, great, great, great. Oh, these are good questions. These are really good questions, Keshia. Let me get you up here. All right. Keshia says, “How will that be identified?” By that, you mean what platform, how would the platform that you integrated with be [00:42:00] identified from the code placed on the site? Or maybe you’re saying how will the purchases be identified? The purchase made, okay. Yeah. That was all our job, right? When we set up the deep data integration like this, what’s happening is we are talking to your eCommerce platform and saying, “Hey, a purchase was made. Give me all the information about it.” In return, all of that information is being displayed on the contact record. Yeah. [00:42:30] Yeah, that’s exactly how you do it. No code needed. There’s nothing you need to do, because that was the … All of the excitement over the announcement is now, all of that data’s going to automatically be passed, every time a purchase has been made, so we’ve done all that.

“Even if you’re using PayPal?” Yeah. You’re right. Keshia, even if you’re using PayPal, and honestly, we don’t even care what you’re using [00:43:00] to check out. If you had a eCommerce store that you manually processed the payments with … I don’t know, maybe you received a check in the mail for something that you’re selling via eCommerce. As long as, in the eCommerce platform, it’s logged as a sale, it’s going to be sent over to ActiveCampaign. That’s what we coded the ability to see, “Okay, WooCommerce, Shopify, [00:43:30] BigCommerce, what do you say a sale is? Okay, whenever that happens, give me all the data.” Yeah, that’s how it works.

Eustan says … I want to put this up, because this is a good one. Not a question, this is more of a statement. I like to do this, because Eustan has been on a few, so he is qualified to teach, at this point. “Chris, couldn’t you create a lead score added to a [00:44:00] purchase that then gives a lifetime value number? An example, $97 purchase as 97 points to a lifetime value leads core.” You could. You could, but again, if I did this, Eustan, it’s essentially the same as total revenue. The only different with a lifetime customer value is like I said.

Let’s say I made $1,000 sale, and [00:44:30] I … How about this? I make a sale for a product that’s $1,000 a month, and my average retention for that product is four months. Then, my lifetime customer value is $4,000. Whereas total revenue looks in the past, lifetime customer value projects forward, [00:45:00] so that’s really the main difference between the two. The reason why we use lifetime customer value, or lifetime value, is to project, so that we can accurately assess what we can afford as far as the cost to acquire a customer. Remember, we’re back to CAC now, CAC, the cost to acquire a customer.

Let me just do this real quick. We’re going to do some math. I enjoy math. I don’t know if you all know, I’ve got an engineering background, [00:45:30] so me and numbers, we get along really well. Let’s just say this. You have a product, and your product is $1,000 a month, okay? Your average retention is four months. That gives us a projected LTV of [00:46:00] $4,000 per … Yeah, we can just say that. Okay, $4,000. Now, the question becomes, how much does it cost you to generate one customer, we’ll say with a LTV of [00:46:30] 4,000. That’s kind of like just a reminder. As long as I can spend under $4,000 to capture or to acquire a customer, then that’s my first indicator, all right, this could work, all right?

If it cost me $500 … Honestly, this is why a lot … I’ll show you this ad strategy. [00:47:00] This is why a lot of people running ads … This is going to be so … Paid media example. I’m simplifying it for the sake of simplifying. There are more metrics involved, but you’ll get the overall picture, right? Let’s say I run paid media, and I spent $1,000 to acquire a customer, all right? Essentially, [00:47:30] month one, what’s my profit? Profit equals zero, okay? Month two, what’s my profit? Profit equals 1,000. You see that? Well, here, let me do this. Let me say 1,000 was my cost [00:48:00] minus 1,000 … 1,000 was my cost, and in return … Yeah, yeah, yeah. It cost me 1,000, and then that first month is essentially 1,000 that I get, right? 1,000 paid equals zero, okay? [00:48:30] I did this backwards. Let me not mess you up. 1,000 received minus the $1,000 it cost me to get that, which puts my profit at zero.

Month two, I don’t have a cost, you see that? The cost fell off, so month two is all profit, or mainly [00:49:00] profit. I don’t want to say all profit. You’ve got operating expenses, right? Month three, month four, so what’s my total… If it costs me 1,000 to acquire a lead, and my average retention is four months, my first month is taken away by my cost to acquire them. The last three months [00:49:30] are all profit. For every $1,000 in, I get $3,000 out, right? Every 1,000 spent, I receive 3,000 in profit. Let me just do approximately, because like I said, these are really safe, round numbers.

Anybody who’s actually running paid media is probably laughing at me right now. They’re like, “There’s so many … What about the conversion rate, and what about [00:50:00] this cost, and that?” But at a very big level, this is it. This is why you’ll hear people say they’re willing to break even. This is why. This is why people break even. This is why they’re willing to break even on the first month, or to acquire a customer, because they have … They’re banking on making the profit later, right? They’re banking on making it later.

Now, [00:50:30] when we talk about making it later, what can break this, everybody? What can break people saying, “You know what? I’m not staying for four months. I’m out of here,” after one … Oh my god, after one month, you’re at zero, right? The key is, you need them to stay. So what is the key to retention? The key to retention is engagement. Now, we’re back into the ballpark of where we started, [00:51:00] and that’s in ActiveCampaign, engaging with people, because retention is our best friend or our worst enemy. Your engagement will tell if this is a blessing or a curse, your retention number, okay? If you’ve got great engagement, you can anticipate this retention number go up. If you’ve got terrible engagement, you can anticipate [00:51:30] that retention number going down, thus greatly affecting your profit margins. I mean, I am a champion and strong advocate of engagement in all forms, so you will never, ever get me off my soapbox of engagement. You can’t stress it enough, because it impacts your marketing across the board, okay?

Eustan, let’s see. This is great. Oh, great, I’m glad you enjoyed it, Eustan. “Some [00:52:00] of this also goes back to your recent podcast about steps, at least going with ad …” Yes. That’s a good point, Eustan. This is the latest … No. Oh, we have a new one. Yeah, but Eustan is talking about this one, Lead Scoring Best Practices. This is a great example of lead scoring, and I provide a framework, honestly. I’m taking this, and I’m creating a guide. The guide will be out next week for [00:52:30] you all to have a framework with how to approach lead scoring, because when we talk about engagement, you can use lead scoring to tell when people are slipping away, right? You can make sure your retention stays solid, okay?

Now, that becomes very important. If you’re somebody who is trying to justify getting lead scoring, and you have numbers similar to this, you know like, “You know what? If I just had a way to extend my subscription another month [00:53:00] or two,” right? If I could do that in lead scoring, implementing a lead scoring strategy to do that for you and keep all things constant, are we really not going to upgrade to get lead scoring when we know we can make money immediately from it?

With that being said, I see that a lot, everybody. A lot of people are looking … I do it, too. I’m not judging anybody. I know I fall victim of it. I have to snap out of it, but a lot of people will look at platforms [00:53:30] that have tiered pricing, and they don’t want to upgrade. They get comfortable at the level that they’re at, and just because it’s one feature up, they’re like, “Well, can’t you just give me that one feature? I don’t need everything else.” Well, what are we really saying? When it comes to business, if we put on our business hat instead of our consumer, save a dollar hat, we put on our business ROI hat, the true question becomes, by upgrading and getting that one feature, how much more [00:54:00] am I able to make without adjusting or changing much of my business?

In this example, I would … I don’t promote violence, so I wouldn’t say … I’m not going to say it. I would strongly envision an event happening around your head area so that you could come to your senses. If these were your numbers, and lead scoring could help you extend this out [00:54:30] a couple months, and you’re complaining that you go from … You have to pay 50 or $100 more a month, that is a tragedy. That is a business tragedy, because what is $100 more a month when you can potentially make 1,000 more? It just doesn’t make sense. It defies all business logic and mathematics. It doesn’t make sense.

That’s why I am a [00:55:00] strong proponent of increasing engagement. Why do we want to increase … If anything you do with ActiveCampaign, use it to increase engagement. All of these automations and all of this data that we’re collecting for you is all for you to increase your engagement by making intelligent decisions based on what you see, based on your open rates, based on goals that they’ve achieved, based on their pathway through automations. With that increased engagement, it just puts [00:55:30] you in position to strengthen your business numbers, okay? But you need to have that engagement, and you need to know what your numbers are, because that’s the difference

I’m telling you, I see business owners all the time. We have the pleasure of seeing accounts being purchased, and the amount of people … I know it seems like it, because sometimes, you go to the blog, and you read comments, you see Facebook posts, everything like that. The amount of people complaining about the cost of the platform, and having to upgrade, [00:56:00] which is still very inexpensive. I’m shocked that people are complaining about that, but when you look at another business that revenue is one million a year or more, they don’t even hesitate to invest. Then, when you see growing companies that are on their way up, they have no issue, at all, paying an extra $50 a month, because they know their numbers.

Now, granted, if you’re selling a $9 product, $9 [00:56:30] a month, you need like six months to justify the upgrade, so I get that. At that point, I would be asking you, “What are you selling that’s … Why do you only have a $9 offering?” How can you productize that, add more value, and get more, so that your numbers are stronger, you know? Don’t just charge more for the sake of making more money. Add more value. How can I add more value to the marketplace, right? All right.

[00:57:00] Eustan, let me put this up there. Forgive me, everybody. Sometimes, I will get on my soapbox. I’m really passionate about business models, and numbers, and making sure that you have a healthy business, everybody. It’s beyond just automation, right? Automation is the means of getting it done. All right. “I don’t know if there is time, but could you give us a quick demo of attribution?” Eustan, I’ll be sure to do that on the next one. [00:57:30] “Based on what you’re saying about upgrading, I’ve been thinking about upgrading for attribution but would love to see it in action.” Absolutely. You have my word, Eustan, Tuesday … Tuesday is going to be interesting, because it’s right after the holiday. We may have to push Tuesday’s to Friday, everybody, because of the holiday. We didn’t take that into account. I’m sorry. You’re very welcome, Keshia. If not Tuesday, for sure Friday, Eustan. Absolutely, on Friday, I’ll go through [00:58:00] attribution so you can see it, and then you can assess and say, “You know what? I can see how this can impact my business and help me grow.”

In closing, I focused a lot on the numbers, everybody. I love numbers, but it’s not all about numbers. Sometimes, the measurable impact of a new feature in the platform is just allowing you to market more effectively, like it’s a positioning play. Like if I could get that feature, I’d be in a better position, because now, I can collect more data and [00:58:30] make more intelligent decisions. Maybe the value of those decisions are beyond a thousand dollars, you know what I’m saying?

Perfect. Okay, yes. You have a great weekend, too, Eustan. Keshia, “I’m lost, but I’ll find a way to catch up, but I did find clarity of something.” Keshia, no worries. Remember, this replay will be up. Anything that you’re lost on, any question, don’t hesitate, Keshia. Don’t hesitate to come back, ask, shoot me an email. Bill, [00:59:00] you have my word, I’ll respond to your video. I am not ignoring you, my friend. Thank you for taking the time to record that and sending it to me. I will reply. Keshia, don’t hesitate. Don’t stay lost, please don’t. Please do not stay lost. If anything, don’t stay lost. Email me, let me know, and I’ll continue to help. Clarity in the key, and understanding your numbers and how to use ActiveCampaign to increase engagements, to strengthen your numbers, is the key to success, everybody, [00:59:30] in your business. All right?

With that being said, okay, Bill, I have your stuff, too. I’m going to copy this, Bill, and work on it. All right, great. Great. Yes, great. Great, Keshia. You have a great weekend, as well. Everybody, great weekend, always good. Of course, you would love the numbers, Brian. I know exactly [01:00:00] why, too. Yes. Every day that we have Office Hours, I’m excited to show you all something new, or just help provide clarity. That’s it. That’s what it’s all about, so thank you for attending. Thank you for giving me an hour plus three minutes of your time today, and I want to make sure that every time you do so, it’s jam-packed with value. Catch the replay, watch it, pause it, work through it, and email me if you get stuck. Everybody, have a great weekend. Wherever you are, be safe, unplug, relax, [01:00:30] refresh, clear your mind, come back next week ready to go and grind.

With that being said, I’ll see you all next week. Question mark Tuesday. For sure Friday, question mark Tuesday. I’ve got to make sure that we’ll be in the office and everything, be running as scheduled, but you all will be notified via email if you’re registered for the Tuesday Office Hours. Thank you again, and see you on the next Office Hours.

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